A very bad fight. Plett and Smith drop the gloves but immediately fall down to the ice. The linesmen rush in to break them up. Plett and Smith aren't so eager to separate and the linesmen have quite a time trying to get them apart. Eventually they do.

Another mediocre fight. Snepsts and Gallant meet behind the North Stars net and decide to fight. They fall down almost instantly however. Gallant is on top of Snepsts and they want to continue their fight on the ice. However the linesmen come in to separate them.

The Detroit-Minnesota game turned ugly. There was some bad blood built up from earlier in the first period. Harold Snepsts got into a fight with Danny Gare. Willi Plett had a brief altercation with Greg Smith. Snepsts got into another scrap. This time it was an uneventful wrestling match with Gerard Gallant.

Tempers got out of hand at the end of the first period. Players from both teams refused to go to their dressing rooms. Players started to mill around the ice. The situation got completely out of control when Danny Gare and Dino Ciccarelli had a fight on the Detroit bench.

Ciccarelli landed two decent right hands to start the bout. Gare missed with a right hand of his own. Then, he grabbed Dino and tugged his head down. Danny landed a partial connect and got Ciccarelli in a headlock. Gare appeared to slip and Dino missed with a left and a right. Danny landed a partial connect with a right hand. Then, he slipped again and Dino got on top of him and started to wrestle.

There was interference as the two started to wrestle. Ron Duguay was along the boards and was the first to grab at the players. Gilles Meloche came over and got hold of Duguay. Harold Snepsts came out of the dressing room to participate in the brawl. He came over to the bench area and did some pushing and shoving. Willi Plett and Greg Smith were wrestling on the actual playing surface.

There was more excitement as Glen Sonmor went over to the Red Wings bench. Sonmor was a master of goon squad hockey with his prior involvement with the Minnesota Fighting Saints and the Birmingham Bulls of the WHA. Detroit coach Nick Polano got into a confrontation with him, although there is no visual evidence that they swapped blows.

The brawl was less than stellar in terms of actual punches landed, but it was quite an entertaining spectacle. The Ciccarelli-Gare bout made for great theater, although neither guy really landed a telling blow. The bout was pretty even as neither man was able to get much leverage on his punches. Gare in particular had a hard time keeping his footing.

The involvement of the coaches added a little excitement to the brawl. There was no punches captured in the video footage, but it added to the chaos on the ice. Harold Snepsts was on a mission to play aggressive hockey in this game. He came off the bench which could have led to fireworks. It was disappointing that Plett and Smith were engaged in mostly wrestling. Overall, it was an exciting sequence of events. This was a reminder of a by-gone era where fights took place on the bench, players didn't always go to the dressing room as directed, and coaches sometimes got involved in the action.

The period ends and both benches clear as players head for the dressing rooms. However since both teams are crossing each other on the ice, some players bump into each other and a crowd quickly forms, drawing everyone in. Willi Plett, Danny Gare, and Greg Smith are in the middle of it. Plett wants to go and has the gloves off with Smith, initiating a fight by throwing punches once the two come together. Other players back off to give them room to go except for Tiger Williams, who tries to jump in after Plett but is held back. However as that fight is going on, Gare winds up pairing off with Dino Ciccarelli and the two wind up mixing it up right into one of the benches. They get their mitst off and scrap, forcing some members of the Detroit Red Wings' coaching and training staff to stay back. Eventually Ron Duguay comes in and reaches over the boards to grab Ciccarelli and pull him away from Gare. However that sets Gillies Meloche and Harold Snepsts in after Duguay. Eddie Mio grabs Meloche and hauls him down while Randy Ladouceur jumps in on Snepsts and wrestles him away from Duguay. In the midst of it all, Gare and Ciccarelli split up on their own and remain on the bench but apart from each other. The linesmen break up Plett and Smith while Minnesota North Stars' Head Coach, Glen Sonmor goes into the bench and he's incensed. Sonmor is held back but he has a few words with a linesman before being pushed back against the glass partition between the benches. Sonmor is cut on the hand but he tries to get back involved, forcing a trainer as well as the Red Wings' Head Coach, Nick Polano to intercede. Polano wrestles Sonmor back while Bob Rouse makes his way into the bench to pair off with Ladouceur among several more players who've entered the bench. Things slowly start to settle but when Polano leaves Sonmor, Polano becomes livid and tries to get after one of the North Stars. Williams wrestles Polano back, pinning him to the glass while Sonmor is escorted off the bench. Detroit's bench finally empties of the players who got in during the brawl but then there's some trash talking going on between both teams, as well as some of the fans at Joe Louis Arena, who target Plett in particular. A long and eventful bench-clearing brawl between these Norris Division rivals.

Thought i read and heard years back that Tiger Williams suckered Tom Mccarthy with a hard right during this brawl. Mccarthy was hurt and went out for a fair duration of time. His career really tapered off. Can anyone substatiate this claim ? It was mentioned when the Kings acquired Tiger the next month on waivers. This event should be added to the Database. Thanks !

Tempers got out of hand at the end of the first period. Players from both teams refused to go to their dressing rooms. Players started to mill around the ice. The situation got completely out of control when Danny Gare and Dino Ciccarelli had a fight on the Detroit bench.

Ciccarelli landed two decent right hands to start the bout. Gare missed with a right hand of his own. Then, he grabbed Dino and tugged his head down. Danny landed a partial connect and got Ciccarelli in a headlock. Gare appeared to slip and Dino missed with a left and a right. Danny landed a partial connect with a right hand. Then, he slipped again and Dino got on top of him and started to wrestle.

The Ciccarelli-Gare bout made for great theater, although neither guy really landed a telling blow. The bout was pretty even as neither man was able to get much leverage on his punches. Gare in particular had a hard time keeping his footing. I rate this fight as a draw. The bout itself was nothing special, but it was fun to watch in the context of the bench-clearing brawl.

Glen Sonmor saw Greg Stefan, who was in civvies on the bench, grab Ciccarelli from behind, he left his own bench to help Ciccarelli. Detroit coach Nick Polano also jumped to the ice and got into an altercation with Sonmor.

Brian Lawton has the puck by the benches but isn't along the boards when he sees an incoming Tiger Williams. Williams lowers his shoulder to bowl into Lawton but Lawton braces himself and gets low, readying for impact. They collide but neither is knocked off their feet although Williams gets his stick up, swinging it into Lawton's face. Lawton drops to the ice and stays down for a while as several of his teammates go after Williams, resulting in a minor melee at centre ice. Cheap highstick from Williams here.